EDITORIAL – Marriages of convenience seldom last

The biggest mistake of those who are using Jun Lozada to fight their political battles for them is that they think conditions prevailing in the Philippines today are similar to those just before the dictator Ferdinand Marcos was ousted in a bloodless revolution.

At the time, conditions in all levels of society were so bad that the saying " even a dog is better than Marcos " was born. And while it was not exactly a dog who took over, Filipinos have learned a very valuable lesson.

And it was that while it was imperative for a bad leader to be replaced, it was not the act of mere replacing that only mattered. Of equal importance was the replacement --- would he or she be any better than the one being replaced or would he or she be in fact worse.

And that is why the Jun Lozada project cannot rise beyond a certain level of being interesting. It was fine listening to him giving lurid details of a scam in which he was in fact a direct participant. Filipinos, after all, are not beyong being suckers for scandal.

But to use Jun Lozada as an agent of change was a big mistake. Jun Lozada is not a hero. He is a heel, a two-timing scalawag whose sins cannot be forgiven just by mere acknowledgement, as what some hypocritical bishops, priests and nuns seem to suggest by their association with him.

Lozada does not inspire change for the better and neither do his principals. In fact, they only augur the worse. Of all the things that cannot stay hidden for long, the two that stay highest on the list are smoke and hypocrisy.

Lozada and his principals do not hold the franchise to truth. They only claim to have a xerox copy of it. When the day of reckoning comes and the Filipino nation rises with its own version of the truth in 2010, Lozada and his principals will regret having so belittled them. 

Lozada and his principals deserve one another. And it is only fitting that they share the same fate when the time comes. Right now, the chinks are beginning to show in their armor. Our fearless forecast is that before the year ends, they will all start quarelling with each other.